…..on June 18th, a little after 5pm to be exact, I was on duty at the famous Speakers Corner, Hyde Park, listening to Lord Soper (God rest his soul), Mr Hanratty wanting a pothumous pardon for his son James (convicted of the infamous `A6 murder`, executed in 1962 and presumed innocent by his father for 40 years, until DNA was discovered), various religious zealots of varying states of sanity and a few others speaking about world domination, support for the IRA, the life of snails and other invertebrates, that sort of thing. It was pretty much a typical tour of duty at this famous symbol of alleged free speech.
Then the radio crackles with our call sign; we are called to an rvp and embussed on one of the familiar `green coaches`, the Metropolitan Police’s equivalent of the Douglas Dakota troop transporter. Word is passed out by our Inspector that there’s been a plane crash at Heathrow and we are going to recover bodies and set up a temporary mortuary. Never expected that one when the duty rota had me slated for Speakers Corner duty. Setting up a temporary mortuary, nice, good job I’d packed my sandwitches. We weaved our way westbound through the traffic laden streets of inner London and were making really good progress until we got to within 5 miles of the location and then everything ground to a halt. Apparantly, the news had gone out very quickly on the BBC radio and TV giving the exact location of the incident. A weird, disparate selection of the great British public had piled the kids, dog and granny into their family cars and set off to see the wreckage – well it was a nice sunny Sunday afternoon. Gridlock ensued and we were eventually stood down because we simply could not get through, although we could smell the pungent paraffin-like aviation fuel in the prevailing wind. Another unit had been assigned and managed to get there from a different direction. I actually got off duty earlier than scheduled. I went home the next day to enjoy some home cooking. The day after than was my 20th birthday.
This link has a film clip showing some of these strange sightseeing creatures milling about amongst the rescuers. When I got home that night, I saw footage of these sickening `family outings` parked up on the side of roads and even on central reservations, sitting and eating potato crisps and spam sandwitches. There were reports of police and fire officers being obstructed by these `ghouls`, some of whom were allegedly trying to carry away bits of wreckage as a souvenir. People! Don’t you just love `em. This would be Britains worst air disaster until the bombing of PanAm flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, 16 years later – and the Met Police would be there too, flown into Scotland with the mortuary and body recovery teams, but on that occasion they managed to get there without Joe Public getting in the way. Respect, to all those who performed that awful task with such professionalism and to those amongst them who still see those unspeakable, pitiful sights when they close their eyes. Just another day at the office.
Forty years ago, blimey!! I need to ride my motorbike, but the weather is so bad here that even the seagulls are heading to the Bay of Biscay.
Everytime there is a car accident, we get what we in the States call the “rubber-necking” factor – people just have to look. I will never understand that desire to gaze upon the misfortunes of others.
That said – HD – I saw the pictures of the weather over there! Batten down the hatches my friend…be safe, be well.
Quite a story! i take it the Met Police is tasked with a lot more jobs than police over here –
Most of those who have had to see airline crashes – and their aftermath – have the memory seared in. I lived in San Diego a few years after the PSA 727 hit the Cessna over North Park and people I spoke with saw nightmarish sights – people hung in trees, limbs on the road…
The kind of stuff some go to shrinks in an effort to forget.
Why one would want to take the family and a picnic to such a sight is beyond me. But it seems to be one of the less admirable attributes of mankind.
My only other near close encounter occurred when I was 19 and working in the back country of Sequoia National Park. A helicopter would fly you in and there you remained for the summer, hauling a chainsaw and clearing all the trails.
Anyway as I recall, a DC3 had been chartered and carrying some gamblers to Las Vegas, and crashed near Mt Whitney. Somebody found it months – or a year? – later and our crew was scheduled to go up there and recover the bodies.
At the last minute we, too, got a reprieve which gave me some relief.
You’ve got some interesting stories HD, and well told. Please keep sharing.
Hard to figure people sometimes. Glad I work a job that doesn’t deal much with the general public – I’m not well suited for it. Thanks goodness for those who do (or did).
I’m an amateur fan of air crash investigations (not going to crashes, but learning about the failure chains involved). That particular crash was one that gave impetus to the concept of Cockpit Resource Management or Crew Resource Management. In the old days, the Captain was God, and the rest of the crew were mere minions to do his bidding.
In this case, there was strong evidence that the First Officer was aware of the problems that lead to the crash, but lacked the force of will to challenge the Captain to correct it.
Today, the Captain still has ultimate responsibility, but it is a foolish Captain that doesn’t use all the people available to him to address any issues.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_European_Airways_Flight_548
There have been a couple of crashes like that xbradte – where the captain is obviously doing something wrong and the first officer is too afraid to speak up. Having an angry captain is not a help to the career.
In this case I went to your link (thanks!) and it almost seemed amateurish – for a captain. Too slow and stall.
On accidents I saw an excellent MOVA production of the KLM and Pan Am – had to have been easily a dozen things in that accident chain – from the bomb threat that diverted all these planes to this small airport – to the KLM pilot deciding to order the tanks full (further preventing earlier lift off – to the fog…..to the KLM FO again afraid to forcefully object (the KLM captain was the head trainer I think and even used in their advertisements).
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/space/deadliest-plane-crash.html
That pilot was, in fact, being used in their ads.
xbradtc, I had a fairly detailed presentation on the crash at Kegworth, where the plane skipped across the M1 motorway. I was on a senir management course on disaster/civil emergency. I also stood by that horrendous front section of Pan Am 103. Kegworth was blamed partly on the new glass cockpit instrumentation, amongst other things. Had a very interesting chat with a survivor.
HD I am getting the feeling you weren’t just a regular Bobby …
On Flt 103 in 1983 I was able to go to Kenya – flew from NY to Nairobi on that very plane, the Clipper of the Seas
Had an interesting conversation with a couple of the flight attendants – since this route was so long – first you get across the Atlantic, landing at Senegal to refuel – thinking the trip is “almost over” – then discovering you had another 5 hours across Africa. Anyway that day the FA told me jokingly that they were known in the industry as “African Queens” – named after the movie for the long slow trip down the river.
I have often wondered if any of them were on that fateful flight 3 years later.
At least the scumbag who planted the bob finally died.
How did you keep your sanity seeing so much carnage and suffering over the years?
Hi Bill,
I was promoted a few times during my 30 years. I don’t know what my equivalent position would be in the US as you have such many and varied LE agencies by comparison. I served in 2 forces, London Metropolitan, 25,000 officers and a County force, 3,500 officers. For my last 12 yrs I was a chief inspector but was in a number of specialist departments as well as a couple of mainstream commands. My last one, before I ejected, was deputy head of traffic division, which had about 220 officers, a place I never thought I’d work but for the last 12 months it was truly great, especially as I toured all the county’s main motorcycle dealers getting them to sign up for a national biker safety and training initative – and got paid for it! I did all sorts of specialist departments and stuff before that. A C/I is 3 ranks below assistant chief constable, or in the Met that would be 4 below Dep Assistant Commisioner – but my heart and soul was with the people at the sharp end where I spent 2/3rds of my career.
As for my sanity – only had that checked once, but thats another story, maybe…